The famous writer and philosopher George Santayana’s quote says ‘those who cannot remember their past are condemned to repeat it’ but perhaps the more pertinent iteration of that question for our times would be “to know your future, you must know your past”. If you examine some of the biggest technology shifts that occurred in food systems in the holocene era, as the Royal Society, (the UK’s national academy of science) did in 2012, these have typically meant selective breeding of strains of crops to fermentation, pasteurization and even refrigeration. What do these innovations portend for the big shifts underway in sourcing our food more ethically and sustainably? In this freewheeling episode of Feeding 10 Billion, we speak to Kurush Dalal, an assistant professor of archaeology at the University of Mumbai, Centre for Extra Mural Studies, who also runs Katy’s Kitchen, one of Mumbai’s foremost Parsi catering companies. As a trained archaeologist, historian and culinary anthropologist, Kurush has some fascinating answers for the question: where did our food come from and how will that inform how we source it in the future?

BIBLIOGRAPHY :

The Atlantic: The 20 most significant inventions in the history of food and drink

Firspost: How potatoes and chillies conquered Indian cuisine

IOSR Journal Of Humanities And Social Science: History of Tomato: The poor man’s apple

Archaeologist caterer Kurush Dalal dissects the evolution of modern foods

Kurush Dalal’s research project at the Western Ghats in Maharashtra - examining the excavations and structures from 1800 CE at Chandore

Land use for Agriculture: FAO

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